Bush challenges state laws allowing marijuana use for medical purposes

The World Today - Monday, 29 November , 2004 12:30:00

Reporter: Lisa Millar

ELEANOR HALL: It's been found to help ameliorate some of the side-effects of chemotherapy, reduce spasms associated with multiple sclerosis and help patients with chronic pain.

But the medical use of marijuana is contentious. In Australia a trial into its use has stalled, despite support last year from the New South Wales Government.

And while ten states in the United States have legalized its use for medical purposes, the Bush administration is now challenging this, arguing in the Supreme Court this week, that these state laws violate federal drug laws.

This report from our North America correspondent Lisa Millar.

LISA MILLAR: Californian Angel Raich drags herself out of bed every morning, barely able to walk.

ANGEL RAICH: I have inoperable brain tumor, I have life threatening wasting syndrome, I have a seizure disorder, I have…

LISA MILLAR: She suffers from nine different diseases, all of them she says making life unbearable. Her only salvation the marijuana she inhales every two hours.

ANGEL RAICH: Cannabis, I use almost 8 to 9 pounds of cannabis per year, which is about 3 ounces a week, and I don't get high. I don't have any euphoria.

LISA MILLAR: Angel Raich and Diane Monson are the two plaintiffs in a case that reaches the US Supreme Court this week.

DIANE MONSON: We've been labeled as criminals and we're really not criminals. I'm a mum. I'm a good citizen, I'm just trying to stay alive. And I don't really think that's a crime.

LISA MILLAR: Lawyer Tom Goldstein says at issue is whether federal drug agents have the authority to prosecute individuals who are abiding by the marijuana laws in their state but breaking federal laws.

TOM GOLDSTEIN: The Government told the Supreme Court that they had to step in because this was a serious blow to the war on drugs. If this little crack in the door could opened who knows what could come next.

LISA MILLAR: In 1996 California became the first state to allow the use of medical marijuana, allowing patients to smoke and grow the drug with a doctor's recommendation. Ten other states followed suit.

There have been various court cases, this latest one has sparked another round of debate about the use of marijuana.

Dr Robert Dupont is the Founding director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

ROBERT DUPONT: Smoke marijuana is not a medicine, I think is not so much the issue of the war on drugs as a war on medicine. We have a system of approvals on medicines and it's perfectly open to any evidence to be presented.

The FDA is ready to review that evidence and marijuana simply is not a medicine. I think some of the chemicals in marijuana may actually prove to be very useful at some point, but smoke marijuana is not a medicine. Modern medicine does not burn leaves and have people inhale the smoke.

LISA MILLAR: Dr Donald Abrams is a professor of clinical medicine at the University of California.

DONALD ABRAMS: Marijuana has been a medicine as Dr Dupont is aware in many cultures for thousands of years. It's only for the last 62 years that marijuana has not been allowed to be a medicine in the United States because of the war on drugs, those really started by one man in the 1930s.

Many people benefit from marijuana. My goal at the University of California, San Francisco is to study marijuana to show it does have benefits in situations where it might be helpful to people who need it.

LISA MILLAR: Angel Raich is hoping for victory this week in the court, but even if she loses, she won't stop using marijuana.

ANGEL REICH: Most definitely. I have no intentions of stopping what I'm doing no matter what the Supreme Court says. I can't because I would die and I'm not willing to allow the fact the Federal Government to executer me for simply being disabled.

ELEANOR HALL: And that report from our North America correspondent Lisa Millar.